Queen Quet, Head-of-State and Chieftess of the Gullah/Geechee Nation, which
once occupied Hilton Head and most of the coastal islands that fringe
the southeastern United States. (Photo by Richard Ellis)
In her story earlier this year for The Nation and the Food & Environment Reporting Network, food policy analyst Leah Douglas exposed an obscure legal loophole through which African-Americans living in rural areas have been systematically disadvantaged. Her telling of one South Carolina family’s story sheds light on the ongoing struggle to retain black-owned farmland in the South.